Finally! A Prophecy About Me!

“Hello, I can help who’s next!” I smiled and waved over the next person in line, catching the eye of an older gentleman in a tweed jacket. He looked like a professor, especially with his bowtie and briefcase. His smile lines and brightly-coloured tie gave me hope for a positive interaction.  “Hello, how can I help you today?” I asked with a pleasant smile. “Hello, how’re you?” The man asked as he set his briefcase down. However, before I could even respond, he continued speaking, “There’s an issue with my account.” My smile wavered, but I forced it in place, “Of course, sir. What seems to be the issue?” “There seems to be no money in my account – I was just paid!” “No problem, we can definitely look into that. You can just swipe your card in the machine on the counter and enter the pin so I can take a look into your account.” The man nodded and pulled out his card, sticking it in the machine. Sure enough, an account popped up. “Alright, and may I please see some ID?” The man rolled his eyes before digging out his driver’s license, as if he was annoyed that I – an employee at the bank – would ask for it. “Thank you, Dr. Hammond. So I can see your recent purchases, would you like me to move through since your last paycheque?” “Yes. Go transaction by transaction.” “Okay.” I took a breath and scrolled down, “I see here that you were paid ten days ago in the amount of three-thousand, seven hundred, sixty-four dollars and nineteen cents.” “That is correct.” “Alrighty. The same day, I see that you placed an online order for food for twenty dollars and eighty-two cents?” “Yes.” One by one, I went through each of his transactions, listing each of them off and the amount. He confirmed every one of them, sounding more and more annoyed as the transactions added up. “And the most recent one was for this morning, at a café, for five dollars and eighteen cents, which was declined, and I see you paid with your credit account. Do any of these sound unfamiliar?” “No. I made all of those purchases,” he responded curtly, as if I were the dumb one. “Then it looks as though you spent your paycheque, Dr. Hammond. If all of these transactions were made by you, then I can’t take anything off.” “But I can’t have spent it that fast! It was almost four thousand dollars!” “Yes, but sir, you spent fifteen hundred of those dollars at a local bookstore.” “They were Christie first-editions! I couldn’t not buy them!” He cried incredulously, “I will not be judged for my spending habits.” “I’m not judging anything, sir,” I replied politely, squeezing my computer mouse tighter, out of sight, “Just going through and confirming information. I can print this out, if you’d like?” Dr. Hammond just sighed in frustration before picking his briefcase back up, “No. That’s unnecessary.” “No problem. Have a good afternoon, Dr. Hammond.”  He just scoffed and turned away.  God, I hoped he wasn’t a financial professor. __________________________________________________________________________________________________________ I sighed and sat back in my seat as I counted the last bill, folding it into a neat stack. After about forty-five minutes of counting, we finally managed to match up the cash with the amount in the computer. “Why does it never match up on the first count?” One of my coworkers complained, half-joking, as she sealed an envelope. “Because that would be too easy,” I replied with a laugh, “C’mon, let’s get this stuff put away.” As myself and the rest of the closers finished shutting everything down, I thought back on the day.  It was as boring and monotonous as it always was, as was perhaps to be expected of a bank. Sure, there was an irate customer here and there, demanding for a resolution to a problem of their own creation. I did have sympathy for a lot of them – money wasn’t an easy thing, and mistakes were made. However, I had significantly less sympathy when they cursed and yelled at me.  Soon, we locked the doors behind us as we exited and each went our different ways home. My feet found their familiar pattern, walking the same steps they had walked about a thousand times.  I pulled out my headphones and played some classical music, selecting Vivaldi to try and lift my mood. I listened to all kinds of music, but I found that classical helped me unwind, add a little bit of romanticism to my day, almost like an epic soundtrack.  It was a lovely day, with the sun shining, suggesting the upcoming warmth of spring. However, that’s all it really did, as Ontario springs were big teases, switching between pleasant to snowy to unbearably hot, sometimes all in one day.  A ping from my phone briefly interrupted the music, and I saw that it was a text from my big sister, Emily. It was a reminder for her engagement party coming up this week, and I quickly sent a reply assuring her that I would be there. It felt weird to know that Emily was going to be married. Our brother, Eric, was already married with a daughter and another kid on the way. I was the youngest of the three of us and the least worried about marriage, but I still felt like I was behind. Emily was an accomplished neurosurgeon and Eric was teaching at the same elementary school we attended as kids. And I…I was a bank teller who watched anime in her free time and dreamed of escaping to a fantasy world.  Not that I lived with my head in the clouds – I had a good job, and I was being considered for a promotion to branch manager soon! There was an apartment in my name as well as a dozen well cared-for plants, and I was even looking at purchasing my own car. Not that I would buy one, since I lived in Toronto, which had a half-decent public transit system and gridlock pretty much everywhere in the city.  I led a perfectly normal, happy life.  However, I had developed an odd habit. It probably was a direct result of the fact that I read a ridiculous amount of fantasy books growing up, then got really into cartoons and anime in highschool, never dropped any of them. A lot of the stuff that I consumed were isekai – a subgenre of fantasy where the main character was whisked away from their normal reality into a new one. The causes ranged from reincarnation, to time-travelling wells, evil video games, and even falling through manholes.  So I ended up constantly on the lookout for potential magical adventures that might be calling. I mean, I tended to stay away from the reincarnation and falling-through-things aspect of isekais, but I did keep an eye out for any wounded princes or magic wands lying around. No luck so far though. Oh well. High hopes, low expectations and all that. Couldn’t hurt to look through an alley or two on the walk home, just in case I saw something interesting.  And lo and behold, I did find something interesting! In a shadowy alleyway there was a puddle. This in and of itself wasn’t particularly interesting, but the puddle was definitely weird. First off, it hadn’t rained nearly enough for there to be such a huge puddle. Of course, it could have been literally any city fluid, and normally I would have stayed far the f**k away. Suspicious puddles in back alleys in a big city were not things that one should normally investigate.  However, the puddle displayed a crystal-blue sky, a couple of clouds drifting through. I glanced up, but the shadows of the evening should have completely covered the alleyway and any view the puddle might have of the grey sky.  Definitely weird, and definitely worth checking out.  I stepped out of the flow of traffic, glancing around the mouth of the alley to make sure no undesirables were lounging around. Thankfully, the alley was empty, so I strolled over to the puddle.  I stood over it, and it showed my reflection back at me, wild red hair, freckles, headphones, and all.  I leaned back, tapping my cheek thoughtfully as I weighed my options.  Now, there was an infinitesimally small chance that this slightly-odd puddle was actually a secret portal to another world. On the other hand, there was a pretty decent chance that this puddle would make an excellent splash.  I was wearing my combat boots, which were generally waterproof, and they needed to be washed anyways.  On all accounts, there were absolutely no downsides to jumping into the puddle.  I hefted my bag and smiled before bending my knees and leaping into the puddle with both feet. I fully expected to land on the hard asphalt of the alley, the bottom half of my legs splattered with what was probably runoff water. I would have appreciated the small moment of joy and gone about my day.  Instead, my heart soared into my throat as my feet didn’t hit anything, instead passing right through the puddle, dragging my body along with it.  I screamed – well, I tried to scream, but it came out all garbled, like my insides weren’t sure how to react.  In seconds, I found myself surrounded by nothing but the open sky and clouds. I tumbled through them, becoming soaked as I passed through the floating water vapor. I was cold as s**t, my skin numbed as the wind whipped it, the water damn near freezing on my skin. Of course, the pain seemed secondary, since my blood was already running too hot and too cold at the same time, filled with a horrible mix of dread and panic, the notion of simply knowing that I was going to die. Either I would fall for eternity, or I would hit the ground and go splat. My hands grasped desperately at the clouds around me, and even though I knew logically that it wouldn’t make a difference, my body still acted in a mad dash to grab at anything that might even slow the fall. Eventually, I broke through the last layer of clouds, just as the song changed. I registered it as “Dies Irae”, the melodious Latin singing filling my ears through the headphones that had miraculously not fallen off.  I was tumbling wildly through the air, but a small part of me recognized that the land before me was absolutely stunning with rolling fields, mountains in the distance, lush forests, and even an ocean sparkling in the evening sun.  This must look pretty cinematic, a part of me thought with a strange calm. I suddenly had an outside point of view of my own body, seeing it tumble through the beautiful blue sky in slow motion, the intense music and quick violins adding drama to the fall, the beating drum matching my own heart. I saw the ground quickly approaching, and I was reminded of a dream I often had, where I fell from an incredible height, woken up when I hit the ground. However, I had the feeling that the exact opposite would happen.  Well, at least I’ll look cool when I die. And then I hit the tree.